Marking my first event as team owner/rental agent the 2012 New England Forest Rally began yesterday in Maine and New Hampshire.
At the wheel is Jamie Beliveau a very good SCCA Rallycross driver who has excellent driving skills but has had bad luck in his stage rally career previously with vehicles that would break and DNF.
Using the ultra durable platform that is the Nissan Frontier and with his brother (and former co-driver of mine at the 2011 International Rally New York) Michael Beliveau, Jamie hoped to tame what is regarded as one of the most difficult and famous stage rallies in the United States.
The New England Forest Rally is known as a car breaker and contains some famous stages such as the Concord Pond Stage named by Travis Pastrana as is favorite stage ever.
Jamie kept the truck upright and on point finishing Day 1 of the Rally and the first of two Regional rallies (running the same roads as the National competitors but split into two events at a lesser cost for those not running in the full National series) in 11th out of the 22 regional entries and 4th out of 8 2WD drivers. Driving conservatively under a "you break it, you buy it policy" for the 20 year old performed beyond expectations and sits in 3rd place in the DMack Tire Challenge (a sub-series for this event with over $2000 in prizes for 2WD competitors who run both days) and looks to keep this position over the coming day. With some 50 miles to be run today it won't be easy to hold his position but if he can run smooth and let the race come to him he should be fine.
Lots of photographers on hand for this big National level event (with drivers such as David Higgins, Antoine L'Estage, Andrew Comrie Picard, Chris Duplessis and more running here) and the photos coming out of it of the Body Armor Outlet.com NISMO Stuff Racing Nissan Frontier are fantastic...Enjoy and hope to have more for you tomorrow!
No comments:
Post a Comment